Great Return: Azerbaijan resettles another 23 families to Lachin PHOTO

The return of former IDPs to the restored Lachin city continues in accordance with the order of Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev.

In this vein, on August 9, another convoy was sent from Gobu Park 3 residential complex in the Garadagh district of Baku, Caliber.Az reports.

At this stage, 23 more families, totalling 93 people, have been resettled in Lachin. Thus, 203 families, totalling 793 people, are permanently residing in Lachin city.

Azerbaijan started the return of former internally displaced persons to the liberated lands in July 2022. Since then, 96 families have been brought back to the Aghali village of the Zangilan district.

In March of this year, 20 families comprising 90 people resettled in Talish, Tartar district. By the end of 2023, the Sus and Zabukh villages of Lachin will also welcome their residents back.

The government of Azerbaijan plans to resettle 2,000 families or 10,000 people in the Karabakh and East Zangazur economic regions by the end of 2023.

According to a decree signed in November 2022 by President Aliyev approving the "First State program on the Great Return to Azerbaijan's liberated territories”, a total of 280,000 hectares (692,000 acres) of lands in the Karabakh and East Zangazur regions will be readied for resettlement by 2026.

By 2026, a total of 34,500 families will be relocated to the Karabakh and East Zangazur regions. To accommodate them, 34,500 apartments and private houses will be built by 2026.

The Lachin district was returned to Azerbaijan on December 1, 2020, after 28 years of being under illegal Armenian occupation following the terms of a Russian-brokered ceasefire deal that sealed the victory of Azerbaijan over Armenia.